Coaching staffs and rosters, both in college and the NFL, will be in a state of flux from now until next season kicks off. Firmly into college football's offseason, the Senior Bowl and the end of the recruiting trail are up next.

Here are four downs for your Wednesday morning, highlighting the biggest midweek stories in college football:

1st Down: Seniors bowling for big bucks

Practice for the annual Senior Bowl began Monday in Mobile, Ala., where rosters representing the North and South will square off Jan. 25. The contest and week of practice leading up to it allows pro prospects another chance to showcase their talents before the NFL Draft, and gives scouts the chance to update their draft grades.

Sports Illustrated's Chris Burke put together a list of a handful of players to watch Saturday who figure to improve their draft stock, including a pair of Tennessee lineman with the size to stack up well in the NFL:

Ja'Wuan James, OT, Tennessee: Began the week by measuring in at 6-6 and 315, with a 33 3/8-inch arm length. That last number will fall in the middle of the offensive linemen pack come the combine, but the size should keep him in the early-round mix for teams hunting for talent at the tackle position. James spent his Tennessee career at right tackle -- part of why he's fallen in Antonio Richardson's shadow heading into draft workouts -- but he might have a future on the left side.

Daniel McCullers, DT, Tennessee: Another Vol, McCullers checked in at 6-6 and a massive 348 pounds (which actually is down from earlier playing weights). He also recorded the widest Senior Bowl wingspan: 85.5 inches. Now, can any team get him to translate that tantalizing combination of physical gifts into consistent play on the field?

That's the question with McCullers, who struggled to keep his motor revved up during his college days. Still, there are very few able-bodied guys with the sort of girth McCullers possesses -- that's one of the reasons Louis Nix III is a possible top-20 pick.

Three players that spent time on the big stage in college but so far haven't lived up to expectations in Mobile are quarterbacks Logan Thomas of Virginia Tech, Tajh Boyd from Clemson and Miami's Stephen Morris. According to NFL scouts and coaches on hand, the trio representing the North squad remained inconsistent on the second day of practice, writes Dane Brugler of CBSSports.com:

If you isolated Tuesday's highlight throws from Thomas, Boyd and Morris, you would have three potential first round picks. But once you add the negative passes and lowlights from the practice, you're left with three physically gifted players who are wildly inconsistent throwing the football. There is still work to be done on these players, but it's hard not to be discouraged by this week's results so far.

• A quarterback who won't be seen in Mobile is former Alabama quarterback AJ McCarron, who grew up a short drive away from the site of the Senior Bowl. Alabama coach Nick Saban said he and the Crimson Tide "would have loved to have seen AJ participate in this game," but understood McCarron's decision to forgo the contest.

• Another former SEC quarterback is in Mobile this week, but not participating due to injury. Even still, Georgia standout Aaron Murray was there to measure in and hopefully "surpass an arbitrary number that likely will make him more palatable to those NFL coaches and personnel people who allow pounds and inches to occupy the same sphere of importance as wins and touchdowns in the nation's toughest collegiate league," writes Sports Illustrated's Andy Staples.

2nd Down: Recruiting trail

While most recruits have found their homes for next season, there are still some that are holding out to make their decision as National Signing Day draws near. Gary Laney of Advance Digital and recruiting writers James Smith of NOLA.com and Matt Scalici of the Alabama Media Group discuss where they think the five best remaining undecideds in the south will end up:

One such recruit, three-star dual-threat quarterback Trace McSorley, became the fourth Vanderbilt recruit to follow Franklin to State College. PennLive.com's Andrew P. Shay took a closer look at McSorley, who brings a skill set the Nittany Lions aren't accustomed to seeing:

The 6-0, 182-pound McSorley is one of the top 20 dual threat quarterbacks in the country for the 2014 class who also played a mean safety on defense for The Briar Woods High School in Ashburn, Va.

Despite the normal size concerns for a quarterback, McSorley brings an awful lot to the table. He accounted for more than 3,400 total yards of offense as a senior with 30 touchdowns passing and additional 13 on the ground.

His arm strength is not up for debate. It's not the type of gun associated with a certain 5-star recruit at Penn State who started as a freshman, but McSorley can fit the ball into tight spots on a rope and has nice touch on downfield throws.

• The bevy of underclassmen leaving college early for the draft leaves an equal number of roster spots and production to account for in 2014. The SEC has 28 of the 98 players who are early entrants to the NFL draft. Here, ESPN picks out the biggest shoes to fill next season and who they expect to plug those holes. The list includes No. 1 overall recruit, running back Leonard Fournette, who LSU fans hope can pick up where team-leading rusher Jeremy Hill left off.

3rd Down: Coaching change season winds down

The annual flurry of coaching firings and hirings is slowly coming to an end. So what did we learn from it? CBSSports.com's Jeremy Fowler compiled some takeaways from coaching season, including who he thinks made the best hire of them all:

8. Washington made the best hire of the season. Schools have been trying to pry Chris Petersen from Boise for years. Washington got him. The Huskies had a swift, efficient plan to supplant Steve Sarkisian. Petersen must show he can recruit consistently in the Pac-12 but not many maximize talent and perform in big games better than him.

• Sports Illustrated's Stewart Mandel is a fan of Washington's hire, too, giving the Huskies an 'A' for nabbing Petersen from Boise State. Mandel, however, wasn't impressed by Louisville hiring former Western Kentucky and Arkansas head coach Bobby Petrino:

The Cardinals could very well win big immediately, because Strong left a stocked cupboard and Petrino is an X's-and-O's savant. At that point, Louisville fans will likely inundate me with taunting emails about this column. But four years from now, after the roster has deteriorated (as it always does) and Petrino has bolted for another job (as he always does), the program may be worse off than it was when it hired him. Grade: D

The College Football Playoff selection committee began two days of meetings on Tuesday to determine, among other things, the number of in-season rankings and a recusal policy to recommend to the Management Committee. The committees are easy to confuse, but here's how they're proposed to work, according to CBSSports' Dennis Dodd:

Generally speaking, we've been led to believe this is going to be like the basketball committee. In that setting, committee members are required to leave the room when their teams are discussed for the bracket. But in football what is "their" team when they have a degree from one place and have coached at another?

The small sample size of games invites that kind of scrutiny. Lloyd Carr is a good example. He coached at Michigan, played Notre Dame a lot as a rival and tried to beat the Pac-10 in the Rose Bowl. What are his recusals, if any, beyond Michigan?

• As football moves on from the BCS, Yahoo Sports is taking a look back at each season during the BCS era to see if things might have played out differently if the champion had been decided in a playoff. For instance, would the hypothetical playoff matchups in 2002 have yielded the pairing of No. 1 Miami and No. 2 Ohio State that produced a Fiesta Bowl thriller? Yahoo's Nick Bromberg thinks so:

We've got a rematch of the Fiesta Bowl. Do we dare think that the outcome is different? It very well could be. It's hard not to look back at the second overtime and wonder how different Miami's offense is with a healthy McGahee, who gruesomely injured his knee in the fourth quarter. But even if we presume that McGahee scores, unless Miami goes for a two-point conversion and the win the game is heading for a third overtime. If the game is extended further, we again think Ohio State figures it out. The Buckeyes still reign.